1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a printing apparatus for printing intended characters, images, etc. on a print substrate, such as a T-shirt.
2. Discussion of the Background
Conventionally, an apparatus and method for printing characters, images, etc. on a print substrate such as a T-shirt, screen printing are known in which a plurality of screens corresponding to printing colors are prepared and are used to print each color on the surface of the print substrate so that printed colors are overlapped. Since the screen printing requires a plurality of exclusive screens corresponding to designs and colors, making the screens is troublesome and expensive. Thus, screen printing is not suitable for high-mix, low-volume production type printing. Recently, methods for printing on a print substrate such as a T-shirt by using an inkjet printer to eject ink droplets directly on the print substrate have been carried out. JP-A-2002-154247 and JP-A-2007-031888 describe such printing apparatuses and methods using an inkjet printer. The contents of JP-A-2002-154247 and JP-A-2007-031888 are incorporated herein by reference in their entirety.
For printing characters, images, etc. on a print substrate made of cloth such as a T-shirt by using an inkjet printer, it may required to conduct a lot of processing operations, such as preprocessing for the purpose of preventing ink blurring and post-processing for the purpose of protecting images printed on the surface of the print substrate. Especially in an industrial printing apparatus, there are many situations that the printing mode should be changed according to the kind of print substrate to be printed and changes in the production line. Thus, there is a need for a printing apparatus and method that can efficiently conduct the printing procedure requiring such a lot of processing steps relative to the print substrate, thereby improving the operating efficiency. Conventional printing apparatuses do not allow for efficient changes.